Problem
I have watched the news and truthfully I am wondering if most of it is a stretch of the actual truth. It has made me very skeptical and out and out critical of a lot of things. My husband who only watches farm related material, is perfectly content to be ignorant of what is going on. Maybe he has a point.
My parents were open minded and encouraged us to know what was going on. I thought that was the way it should be. Now I am not so sure that being well informed isn’t actually detrimental. I wonder how many bad things can go on in the world and from one year to the next it just seems to get worse. Is there nothing good going on in our country or for that matter the rest of the planet? My husband says I need to get out of my addictive behavior and turn the news off. He even said I’d be less of a complainer. Truthfully I did not see my telling him what was going on in the world as being a complainer. Maybe I’m confused and to tell the truth somewhat lost in what seems like and lot of anger and negativity.
Discussion
I do think that staying up on everything is complicated. It seems to me at least that the bad news gets peoples’ attention and the good news gets passed by. If you are only hearing bad news, I’m sure that it would bring your thinking to the point of just thinking of all that is not working.
I am encouraging you to stay away from news channels that focus on most of the bad things that are going on. We know that something is always going on, but the truth is that there are a lot of good people doing good things. If you can’t find a channel that talks about good things, give yourself a break from watching the news. I heard that if something major is going on we will find out about pretty quickly. Give yourself a break and see how you feel at the end of a couple of weeks. Stay away from scrolling through your phone, watching the bad news on television and see if that feels better.
If we program our mind to look for the bad news, we will naturally gravitate towards a negative outlook. Read an inspirational book, go to church, volunteer to do some good work in your community. Put something good out in the world and surely that would change the way you are thinking. Do something good for someone and see how that seems to have a return effect.
If we are stuck the only way to get unstuck is to change something. About the only thing we can change is our mind, but that is a major game changer. Try a few of these things and see how you are thinking in a month or so.
To submit problems, contact Juanita Sanchez, psychotherapist, by email at [email protected] or through High Plains Journal.
